32 MEXICO AND CENTRAL AMERICA 



are now extinct and others are rapidly approaching 

 extinction through the substitution of Spanish. A 

 number of languages, however, are still spoken by hun- 

 dreds of thousands of natives. 



The language having the greatest geographical exten- 

 sion within the area under consideration is the Nahuan, 

 now consolidated with the Piman, Shoshonean, etc., in 

 a great stock called the Uto-Aztecan. In its extent this 

 stock may be compared to the Indo-Iranian of the 

 Old World which comprises most of the modern and 

 ancient languages of Europe as well as those of a large 

 part of Asia. Within the United States are the numer- 

 ous Shoshonean tribes found as far north as Idaho, 

 reaching into California on the one hand and into 

 Texas on the other. In southern Arizona and north- 

 western Mexico come the Piman group. East of the 

 Sierra Madre are the Tarahumare and the Tepehuane. 

 These languages are mutually unintelligible, although 

 morphologically related, and all are subdivided into 

 dialects. The relationship is proved through laborious 

 comparison and analysis of the words and grammar, in 

 the same way as the philologist proves that Persian, 

 Greek, Russian, English and Welsh are all cognate 

 tongues. Farther to the south are still other divisions 

 of the stock; including the Huichol and Cora of the 

 mountainous region north of Guadalajara and the 

 Mexican or Aztecan of the valley of Mexico and adja- 

 cent country. The Mexican language is still spoken by 

 a million or more natives and is divided into a number of 

 dialects. Properly the Aztecs are a single tribe whose 

 chief city was Tenochtitlan, the ancient Mexican City. 

 They first appear on the page of history as the Mexitin 

 in 1090 A.D., but the closely related Chalca, Xochi- 

 milca, etc., appear at considerably earlier times. 

 Mexican colonies were widespread before the coming of 



